Leading by example.

It might have nothing to do with chess. Or has it?

Last year I wrote a post of a former schoolteacher colleague, Lambis Englezos, an amateur historian who claimed to know the whereabouts of 173 Australian soldiers unaccounted for from WW1. They were in a paddock somewhere in France.

For 6 years Lambis’ investigations received ridicule from both the highest ranks of Government Departments, and journalists he’d harangue about his theory.

But with dignity, and patience, Lambis persisted.

During the week he was vindicated. Human remains from that paddock in France indicate the site is in fact a mass burial site from WW1- the largest grave uncovered since WW1.

Perhaps it was Nine News correspondent James Talia’s humble pie, or Dr Peter Stanleys, director of the Centre for Historical Research at the National Museum of Australia, admission of ‘egg on face’ that puts into perspective what a remarkable story this is.

Lambis persued his project, not for fame, or recognition, or money, but because, deep down he thought it was just the right thing to do. He had a moral purpose. And when human remains were discovered last week, he remained humble and decent when others would have shouted “I told you so”.

Persistence, resilience, planning, strategy, dignity, patience: sound familiar?

There's probably a lot you could write about this story. And no doubt others will. The most important thing to say is : Well done, Lambis.

This Learning Life 2- University of Bristol 19-21 June 2008

This Learning Life 2 Conference, held in Bristol UK, is for everyone who wishes education to provide all young people with a more powerful preparation for life in the 21st century.

The presumption is that current 'schooling' often develops a rather arcane and anachronistic set of learning skills and attitudes; and if education is in part a preparation for lifelong learning, richer models of learning might prove fruitful.

Jonathan Rowson is presenting a paper titled: Belonging to a Community that Loves to Think: Chess, Intellectual Character, and Social Capital and has kindly sent us the abstract of his presentation.

For those who know chess from the inside, there is little doubt that the game helps you educationally, but we seem to lack a compelling theory to explain why what is learned from chess might be transferable to other domains, and consequently we struggle to convince policy makers that chess might have an important role to play in improving formal education.

The conventional arguments are principally cognitive and largely intuitive, for instance chess improves your capacity to make informed decisions, shows you the rewards of planning ahead and reveals the importance of thinking about the opponent's intentions. While this may all be true, it fails to capture the uniqueness of chess (perceived difficulty, perpetual decision-making, absence of luck, responsibility, benign competitive context, established etiquette, clear rules etc)and the exclusively cognitive emphasis reinforces the stereotype of chess as something abstract and antisocial.

In my own experience, from learning the game as a five year old, to taking time off school to compete in competitions, to becoming British Champion in three consecutive years, the biggest benefit of chess has been the impact it has had on my attitude to thinking and learning, formed partly through the demands of the game, but also through diverse experiences of people, clubs, tournaments and travel opportunities that I would not otherwise have been exposed to.

This paper will examine chess from the perspective of what Harvard Educationalist Ron Ritchart calls Intellectual Character. The educational value of chess, I argue, is not that it gives you skills that may or may not transfer, or abilities that one may have to a greater or lesser degree, but that it helps to create and sustain intellectual character. Chess has to potential to slowly transform one's attitude, understanding and approach to one's own intellect, and thereby foster deep enduring dispositions about learning and thinking that can gradually become part of one's character. For instance, in my experience chess players, for all their faults and idiosyncrasies, are typically highly curious, enjoy working things out, reflexively think of perspectives other than their own, and deeply value the experience of concentration.

This kind of intellectual character is by no means exclusive to chess players, and can develop in various supportive and challenging contexts. However, I will argue that chess is a good example of how subcultures for tacit and informal learning are created, and will build on existing research on chess as a tool for building social capital (positive networks beyond the family and school) in deprived communities (Chess Development in Aberdeen Primary Schools: A Study of Literacy and Social Capital, A Scottish Executive Education Department Sponsored Research Project,Forest
et al, 2005).

The overarching aim of the paper is to use chess as an example of real-life learning that illuminates the relevance of intellectual character and social capital and highlights the importance of their relationship. I hope my paper will thereby help to illustrate the theme of the conference and not only show that many of our most formative learning experiences take place outside of the classroom, but use my experience with chess to explain why.

Chess Squared goes to Maryborough

Students at Maryborough Education Centre , 45km west of Castlemaine, are fast becoming proficient chess players.

In term 1 our program developer, Harry Poulton, worked with Well-Being Officer Marg Gallagher to adapt the Chess-Squared Program to Years 3-4-5-6 students at Maryborough Education Centre, and the results were immediate.

Gallagher said: ‘The level of interest of even the youngest students has been astonishing and their skills acquisition has been most impressive. Chess builds resilience and supports students in important learning areas such as Mathematics and Wellbeing.’

'Many students have displayed excellent organisation and planning skills in a short space of time and their enthusiasm for the game has been sustained.'

Poulton observed: “It seems the MEC has a commitment to combining innovation and pastoral care into all programs to deliver quality education to students with diverse needs.”


Poulton has noted a direct relationship with the level of support from the classroom teacher and the success of the program in all schools he has worked in. The success, it seems, isnt just having a tutor, but the subtle messages the classroom teacher gives out. Their presence, and level of involvement, give students strong messages.

With help from the parents club, the school has recently acquired two large chess sets which are in great demand as a playground activity.

Jonathan Rowson- an interesting thinker

I first came across the work of Guy Claxton reading Sam Grumonts blog and thinkings about slow-learning. Two of Claxton’s more interesting ideas are i)that the mind needs to be given time to create meaning hence the phrase slow learning, and ii) that the modern maths curriculum has lost its way.

Almost serendipidously, we met Jonathan Rowson in Aberdeen last year. Interesting fellow Rowson.

Born in Aberdeen, he’s Scotlands 3rd chess grandmaster, has completed first class degree from Oxford, and is presently studying a Doctoral thesis on wisdom with Guy Claxton as supervisor.

So when Rowson talks about education, and learning, and where chess fits into that landscape his ideas are well worth consideration.

Rowson’s presentation from Aberdeen argued we need to keep grappling with the question “What’s so special about chess”, and his answer at present is based on the premise that thinking is the skill that enables us to acquire meaning. He asserts that chess offers the opportunity for people to make meaning through the consequences of their decisions.

Rowson goes on to explore the concept of engagement within a chess context and poses the question ‘where is the educational value the greatest’ within this framework.



Rowsons presentation is certainly provocative and can be found here.

(photo above shows Jonathan Rowson (R) with the Lord Provost of Aberdeen(L) after announcing the Jonathan Rowson Award for all children of Aberdeen who pass a certain requirement.)

2008 Begins

Before we knew it, 2008 was well and truly underway. As our ‘man-on-the-ground’ Sam Grumont has taken a coaching position in other parts Loddon, our link between the 12 schools is relying solely on e-mail. This will certainly make things challenging.

Our focus this year will be ‘whats happening in the classrooms’, and 'research perpsectives', and by the end of the year we want profiles from all of the schools, all of our tutors, and some insights into our research journey.

Harry and I are developing research projects, and will provide previews about what our research is about. By engaging in this on-line learning community you are participating in developing a form of data. Comments, contributions, and reflections, are all qualitative, valid forms of rich data called extant data.

So what you might ask? If you’re a teacher in Victoria you might (or might not) have noticed teachers are now mandated to have a documented 100 hours of professional learning every five years, and 50 of those hours have to have a research base, IF THEY ARE TO MAINTAIN THEIR TEACHER REGISTRATION. That’s a pretty radical shift in our working conditions, and one I haven’t heard too much discourse about on the coalface.

May I humbly suggest, participating in this project and joining in the conversation, may go towards meeting some of those criteria. I’ll explain in more detail in a future post.

On a slightly quirkier note, Thursday the 8th May sees the R-U-MAD (r u Making A Difference Day) being held at Castlemaine Secondary College, where the whole school community will be involved in examining the question: ‘what can you do to make a difference.?’

In Sydney, it also sees the launch of Chess: The Musical, held at Sydneys THEATRE ROYAL. No, I’m not mad and if you don’t believe me look here.

Let the game begin, and remember: white goes first!

THE AUSTRALIAN 24/11/07: Schools make the move to chess. By Justine Ferrari

NO longer the secret, dusty passion of nerdy types that live in the school library, chess is now the fastest growing sport in the nation's schools.

Even members of the footy team play chess these days.

The national school chess competition has grown exponentially over the past five years, by 40 to 50 per cent every year, with some competitors as young as five.

Other schools are taking chess out of the lunch hour and integrating it into their maths classes for the strategic thinking and problem-solving skills the game fosters.

Brighton Grammar School in Melbourne prides itself on being a chess school, and is currently leading the national competition with players like nine-year-old Isaac Ng.

Chess has been part of the school for about 15 years and sets are provided to encourage the students to play it at lunchtime or after school, including an outdoor set with large pieces.

Director of community education John Phillips said chess had shed its nerdy image at the school, with boys of all interests playing it, including the sporting types.

"Partly that's due to the success the school has had in chess competitions in the past few years," Mr Phillips said.

In the Castlemaine area in central Victoria, a program integrating chess into maths lessons for Year 6 students has been running for the past two years and is taught in about 12 local primary schools and Castlemaine Secondary College. Co-creator Steve Carroll said it was teaching students a way of thinking mathematically and confidence to approach tricky problems rather than actual mathematical knowledge.

"Many of the teachers have been surprised because they assumed the kids who were smart would be good at chess but the kids excelling in chess are different to the ones excelling in maths.

"It's creating success for low-achieving kids and having a profound effect on their attitudes to school and maths," Mr Carroll said.

The National Interschool Chess Championships, to be held next month, are organised by Chess Kids, a company that markets recreational and educational chess programs to school.

It was started about 10 years ago by chess enthusiast David Cordover, who said school chess had exploded in the past four or five years, which he attributed to the greater value placed on intelligence in the community.

"People see all these internet billionaires and think being a computer geek isn't so bad after all," he said.

"People know that we're in a knowledge economy and kids have to do well at school."

My Brilliant Brain- National Geographic Documentary

My Brilliant Brain is a 3-part series examining the concept of genius- and putting forward the notion that genius is created through perserverence and hard work.

The first episode, screened in Australia last Friday on Pay TV, traced the story of Grandmaster Susan Polgar, who was bought up by her psychologist father as an experiment to prove that, if trained properly, a female can be as competitve on the chess board as any male. In the 1970's this was radical thinking as no female could get close to the top 600 male players in the world.

Some of Susans better party tricks include playing an opponent over the phone- and beating them- without being able to see a chess board. Or, sitting outside a cafe, truck drives past in peak hour traffic with a chess board painted on the side. She gets a three second glance, then places 32 pieces in exactly the same configuration on a chess board in front of her!

Computer animation explains how Polgars brain is different from mine or Sam Grumonts, by using the face recognition part to identify millions of chess combinations.

If you want to watch the 46 minute doco on-line, click here.

The 'J' Factor

Mark Johansson has ‘gone the extra yard’ this year with chess coaching on the junior campus of Castlemaine Secondary College. And the tournament results have been rewarding.

Twice a week, for the whole year, Johansson’s voice booms over the lunchtime announcements: : “CHESSSSSSS……. IS……ONNNNNN….….IN …..LAWWWSON….. HAAAALL!” where the ‘true believers’ refine their skills in a relaxed and informal environment. But, on the tournament circuit it’s a different story.

On August 16 a team competed at Bendigo where they won their age division and finished third overall behind Red Cliffs Secondary College seniors and Bendigo Senior Secondary College.

The troupe ventured over to Ballarat in early September, where they won not only their age group (junior secondary) but won the open secondary division also. Out of 50 students the team monopolised individual placings earning 14 of the top 20 spots.

In the September holidays, Mark and Harry took 6 students to the Victorian Youth Masters. The best finisher was Shay Keillor-Reed, coming third in his age category.

Hungry for match practice, Johansson organised a tournament at CSC Junior Campus where players ventured over from Maryborough. Again, Johansson’s team won their category.

Having now qualified 10 players for the State Finals they finishied a creditable ninth in Victoria. Shay Keillor-Reed finished 16th and Max Nanchman finished 20th out of the state’s elite 110 players.

Johansson was upbeat: “These guys were great- they are only in yr 7 but were competing against yr 8’s and 9’s. The next few years should see our school perform really well.”

As recognition to our cluster’s commitment to promoting chess, the junior campus has been given a ‘wild-card entry’ into the National Interschool Championships to be held in Melbourne in December.

Overall Mark, a great years work!

Sam Grumont interviews Ross Allengame

It's stalwarts like Ross Allengame who make Chess-Squared successful. Here, the Castlemaine Primary School teacher talks to Sam Grumont about his recent success in our cluster tournament and the benefits of chess in his classroom.

Sam: what is your reaction to your kids winning the chess tournament?

Ross: I was very, very pleased with the way they performed. I was a bit worried about round 5 as they all had one defeat by then but they managed wins in the next two rounds.

Sam: are they all grade 4 students?

Ross: the majority are grade 4 with 4 grade 5 kids and two grade 6 kids. Oscar Black won the boys champion, he’s a quiet achiever, and he only started playing chess this year. He plays his father at home and me at lunchtimes quite often, taking notes and participated in chess seminars during last holidays.

Sam: what do you attribute the success and enthusiasm of the kids in playing chess?

Ross: probably how you set the room up and what you are really trying to achieve with the game of chess. Are you trying to achieve a passive sort of game or are you really making it a game of war where there is a bit of competition to see who can actually win? If so who is going to win on points, going to win on time, and who’s going to be king of the heap?

Sam: Can you tell us a little about the tables and the round robin competition?

Ross: That has provided a focus for everyone to come back after ten weeks to see where they are up to, making sure they are here on a Thursday to make sure they don’t go down in points and also giving those people who are really good that keen eyes like who’s coming up to beat them and working out tactics for who to play to get more points in the game.

Sam: some kids have surprised you this year?

Ross: I’ve got a lot of troubled children in my room. They’ve had a lot of behaviour problems, a lot of issues at home, a lot of personal issues, but chess has been a way of keeping them concentrated over a period of time. They’ve actually concentrated more with chess and pass that back into the classroom with their ordinary work, keeping things a lot quieter, concentrating and not annoying other kids in the room.

Sam: Finally what pieces of advice do you have for someone setting up chess for the first time?

Ross: keep it simple. I’d probably do something similar to my dungeons to warlords system for teaching chess and then I’d probably go into a competition scenario where there is a round robin or a day chess competition. You don’t need a lot of knowledge with chess, I can play only a little above kids chess but a little bit of extra help with expertise as we have with the chess tutors, can be very handy. It’s a learning curve for you as a teacher.

A message to CISCCON from Harry Poulton

Harry Poulton is one of our tutors, and the driving force behind the Chess-Squared Program.

A mastery learner is one who perseveres and doesn't give up. Let's just say this video is a victory for man over technology!

Aberdeen CISCCON Report

It seems strange travelling halfway around the world, to participate in something related to your work, only to fly home again before you feel you can write about it. The whole Scotland thing was simply amazing: a once in a lifetime opportunity.

The night before the conference there was a dinner at The StageDoor Restaurant in Aberdeen.

The luck of the draw at the restaurant table seatings was interesting. The 3 aussies were surrounded by Chess Grandmasters with lots of banter about rankings, ratings and who the next big thing in chess would be. (It wont be an aussie).

Sam Grumont saved the night. I never thought I’d be so happy to hear his stories about China and America that I’ve heard a 100 times - but they were an absolute bloody lifesaver.

It seems the conference had two sub-cultures: the educators and the chess-elite. Educators can see the benefits of chess, while the chess-elite want chess in schools but don’t understand the subtleties to make that happen. So it was a fascinating mix filled with mutual respect and sharing of knowledge.

But the tide turned the morning of the conference, when conference organiser Dodd Forest informed us the Vice Chancellor of the University wanted to talk to us specifically about our project. It seems Aberdeen University prides itself on all things Innovative and Enterprising- words used in the description of our presentation.

When the conference started we felt back in our comfort zone.

Janet Shucksmith, from Teeside University, started the conference with her presenation about ethical issues involved with children and educational research.Ferdinand Gobet presented his research into brain studies and the chess player.

Susan Polgar, bought up as an experiment by her father to prove genius can be created, told her amazing life story, followed by Fritz Gaspard who co-ordinates the $4million Chess In The Schools Program in New york.

Day 2 saw Virginia Morrow, from University of London, kick things off with a presentation about Social Capital, that had elements of CSC’s Enterprise Education Project, and resonated big-time with Chess-Squared. After our presentation on Day 2, Virginia came up and said how excited she was schools in Australia were involved with building Social Capital.

The final presenation, and one of the most interesting was from Fernando Moreno (pictured with Steve Tobias), who uses chess as a tool for counselling and well-being. I’ll be doing a separate post exploring some of Fernandos work.
Apart from the conference itself, the hospitality was par excellence. It left you with a great endorsement for any country you visit: what a great place, and what great people.
It will be interesting to see what projects spin off from the conference. Informal conversations indicate people from Aberdeen Uni (Scotland), Belfast Uni (Ireland), Turin Univesity (Italy) and programs in America are interested in developing some sort of collaboration.

National Literacy and Numeracy Week Award Ceremony

On the Tuesday 4th of September the Mt Alexander School Cluster Chess/Numeracy contingent met at Castlemaine Railway Station to travel to the Melbourne Zoo to collect a ‘National Numeracy Award’ for the chess squared program.

Leeane Preece, Liz Granger (acting principal Winters’ Flat P.S.), Harry Poulton (chess tutor), Paige McDonald (year 6 student Winters’ Flat P.S) and Shay Kielor-Reed (CSC jun campus) were there to represent our Castlemaine Secondary College and our primary schools.

It was an enjoyable trip, with Leeanne having organized everything in advance, we arrived on time at the Zoo. Shay and Paige were mesmerized by all the possibilities to explore the animal kingdom offered by the venue. We spent about twenty minutes wandering about the zoo and our two young chess aficionados got to meet the lions and an assortment of exotic creatures.

When we entered the actual conference venue were greeted by a rather loud gentleman on stilts, and dressed in a coat covered in numbers, who took an instant interest in our little group, and on the other side of the entrance was a fellow similarly dressed, and riding a one wheel bike.

Inside the conference hall the festive atmosphere and humor was maintained by a remarkably amusing compare who kept us in fits of laughter with his one-liners, often at the expense of the audience and the prize winners. His humor was light hearted, witty and fun with impeccable timing.

In all it was a wonderful celebration to recognise what we have achieved, through community collaborations, in such a short space of time.

Postcards from ABERDEEN Scotland

A message from Susan Polgar

We have had technology hassles so have not been able to bring updates from this amazing conference in Aberdeen.
This has really bought together a global context of goodwill by people wanting to improve education through chess.
Susan Polgar very kindly signed pictures for each of our primary schools and each of our tutors. And here's the picture to prove it.
As usual, Steve and Sam are hard at work in the background.
These links from Susans blog are stories from the conference.

Conference dinner

Supporting Chess-Squared

In action!

Postcard from Scotland

Its been a constant case of ‘the chords have got the better of me’. It seems at every turn, a battery is flat, the wrong chord got packed, or that thing I disgarded at the last minute, I wish I hadn’t!

The three amigos caught up with Harry on Saturday, hours before our flight, to hand him a hard copy of our presentation……just because it seemed the right thing to do. Sitting in the courtyard of Saffs waxing lyrical about the finer points of our talk and program, I flicked the switched and asked Harry for an impromptu message to send to the conference.

We are going to use this clip as a conclusion of our presentation. You can see the video on the right hand side of this page.

Counting Down......

The Chess-Squared contingent will this week be fine tuning it’s presentation for the Chess In Schools and Communities International Conference held at Aberdeen University Scotland on 27August- 2 September. Below are the 9 Keynote Presentations from a diverse and expert range of presenters:

 Children’s Involvement in Education: Ethical Issues and Empowering Research Policy and Practice: Janet Shucksmith, Teesside University

 What does Research into Expertise tell us about Chess Teaching and Coaching?: Ferdinand Gobet, Brunel University

 Chess and Education: the Re-creation of Learning School, Home and Community: Susan Polgar, Grandmaster and Director of SPICE at Texas Tech University & Ali Nihat Yazici, Turkish Chess Federation

 Development and Impact of Chess-in-the-Schools in New York City Public Schools: Marley Kaplan, Chess in the Schools, New York

 Children and Social Capital: Virginia Morrow, University of London

 Chess: Just a Game or a Powerful Teaching Strategy for Learning Mathematics: Dr Steve Tobias, (James Cook University, Townsville, Australia) Steve Carroll (Castlemaine Secondary College), Harry Poulton (Castlemaine Chess Club) and Sam Grumont (Castlemaine Innovations and Excellence School Cluster Coordinator)

 The Rewards of Self-Control and the Joys of Concentration: What Chess Might Teach us About Learning: Jonathan Rowson, British Chess Champion (2004 – 2006)

 Children’s Health and Well Being: the Process of Mentoring and Coaching in Informal Education: Kate Philip, University of Aberdeen

 Using Chess in a Counseling/Mentoring Approach for Students : Fernando Moreno, Montgomery County Public Schools

Apart from the Keynote Presentations, there will 21 workshops presented on a range of topics related to chess and education from presenters from all around the world.

We will have highlights from the conference listed on our blog, while we're in Scotland.

National Literacy & Numeracy Week: 3rd-9th September

Last week, Castlemaine Secondary College recieved notification the CHESS-SQUARED Program is the recipient of National Numeracy Award.

Twenty-three schools across Victoria will be recognised for their significant contribution to either Literacy or Numeracy.

The CHESS-SQUARED Program sent tutors from the Castlemaine Chess Club into classrooms of 12 schools in the Mt. Alexander cluster of schools.

Leanne Preece (Principal CSC), Kevin Brown (Principal Newstead P.S), Harry Poulton (Convenor Castlemaine Chess Club) and two students will attend a ceremony at Melbourne Zoo on 4th Septmeber.

The award will be either $2000, $5000, or $10,000 and will go towards the continuation of our program. We will find out the category of award at the ceremony.

Is that a FLYING BUTTRESS I saw??

Local philanthropic organisation, GOLDEN HOPE, has made a significant donation to the youth of Mt. Alexander purchasing 3 double decker buses to be used as Youth Outreach Spaces.

GOLDEN HOPE founder, Max Lesser, says the vehicles aim to be a link with youth mental health and the local community, and has developed other teacher resources using art/ design and geometry to enhance youth wellness.

Among other things, Lesser is keen to see chess play a prominent role in activities conducted on the buses, including the unique geometrical student designs adorning the outside of the bus in chess motifs. (Max, that’s just so cooooool!!)

Year 9 students from Castlemaine Secondary College, as part of the Enterprise Education initiative, aim to have a role planning activities, promotion and co-ordination for Friday and Saturday night activities. A GOLDEN HOPE press release reads:

GOLDEN HOPE announces the purchase of our flagship, and resource gift, to Mount Alexander youth- the FLYING BUTTRESS- a 1972 model double decker bus.

The bus will be used as a mobile youth-space, meeting place, an office for youth generated issues, 'events central' and a 'go to' option on our streetscape that through its visibility and presence echo the importance to us of our youths happiness, freedoms, connectedness, and the fun and hope they epitomise as our kin.

The bus plans to be in operation before Christmas 'o7 as a regular Friday, Saturday evening feature, located in appropriate sites in central Castlemaine , as well as responding to events and needs dictated by youth and community.

Golden Hope is a Chewton based philanthropic group who:

 respond to youth self esteem and emotional health support structures, with a ‘can-do’ ethos,
 have a committment to fun, and
 support the future safe passage of youth whilst under community guardianship.

The FLYING BUTTRESS management group thank Golden Hope, Mount Alexander Shire Council, and the Castlemaine community and youth for their encouragement and are looking forward to working together 'on the buses'.

And Max, we thank you!

If first you dont succeed, try, try..................and try some more.

When we here that cliché in education, ‘lifelong learning’, what does it really mean? I’m sure it means different things to different people.

For me, it has something to do with finding things that are interesting, meaningful, and give a personal sense of joy and satisfaction, and persuing those things with a sense of passion.

The recent story of Melbourne schoolteacher, and former colleague, Lambis Englezos (pictured above) fits my definition of what lifelong learning is really about. Lambis had a penchant for war history, and in particular the little known WW1 Battle of Fromelles in France.

Without going into detail, Lambis suspected there were some unaccounted Australian soldiers, known as ‘The Missing’, buried in a pit on the fields of Fromelles.

Lambis came into work one day with an aerial photo a week after the 1916 battle. In a small corner were 8 small marks in row. They could have been anything.
That’s were they are! Lambis exclaimed.I pointed out the evidence was hardly scientific. But Lambis persisted.

6 months later he came in with another ariel photo, from different source, taken days before the battle- and sure enough the pits weren’t there.

Lambis and group of supporters put their case to the Federal Government War Historians, only to be dismissed. But Lambis persisited. Years later, he unearthed a German Red-cross account of Australian soldiers being buried at a place known as Pheasant Wood- the exact location of his aerial photos. The evidence was almost irrefutable.

Finally, he unearthed family diaries that once again made mention the mass burial at Pheasant Wood. The government assured Lambis that the bodies had been recovered in later reconnaisence to reclaim bodies from European battlefields. However, after spending 12 months searching official records, War History Unit concluded that such a recovery had never taken place.

Eventually, the Australian Government relented and in May this year hired an expert panel from Glasgow University to study the site. Their finding, released last week, suggest the site has not been disturbed since 1916, and is highly likely to be the burial place of a 162 Australian soldiers, and up to 300 British soldiers.

If so, it is the largest unmarked mass grave unearthed since WW2.

Persistence, resilience, planning, strategy, self-control………sound familiar? The very attributes we are trying to teach with chess? These are the skills young people need to be equipped with from any education, that will set the foundations for lifelong learning. And something Lambis has modelled brilliantly.

The full story can be found here.

The art of ETHNOGRAPHY

Ethnography is an qualitative educational research method developed by anthropologists, where culture is the central construct: it is literally the description of a social group. As a process, it is the science of cultural description and represents a dynamic ‘picture’ of the way of life of some interacting social group.

A famous anthropologist observed by way of analogy, “The last thing a fish will see is water’. What may seem remarkable to a visitor from another culture may seem matter of fact to the local person.

A caricature of an ethnographer is a middle-aged anglo-saxon sitting in front of their tent diligently writing in their notebook the events of the day.

Harry has been getting students to write about their chess experiences and has collected over 100 vignettes, when compiled are building a snapshot of what’s happening with the chess program, in ways that may not at first seem obvious.
Two stories below give a really rich, or ‘thick’ description about some of the ways our chess program is impacting on students.

It would be interesting to hear people’s comments about how they interpret different aspects of the comments below.

Grade 6-girl Age 11 years old, Chewton Primary School, Mt Alexander School Cluster, Central Victoria. Came running up to when I arrived to tutor at Chewton Primary School, and she was overjoyed and bursting to tell about her victory over her step dad

(In her own words).
I play chess at home with my step dad and we played for three hours like a footy game. I beat him! It was a long tough game. After I won my mum said you were beaten by an 11 year old girl and my stepdad said, “I want a re-match!!!” I think he was embarrassed. Chess teaches me to build strategy. When I played my step dad he like pretended he had a plan but he didn’t. So I was able to take his queen.
I like playing chess in school it is fun. It has made me think about what can happen if I make a wrong move and a right move. I think about where I am going to move and if I move there what will happen. I play chess with my brother and sister.

Grade 6-boy Age 12 years old, Chewton Primary School, Mt Alexander School Cluster, Central Victoria. Has a history of low performance and has started to shine with the advent of the chess program.

(In his own words)
I like to play chess. It is the best strategy game I have played. It is challenging playing Harry and my Dad. My Great Grand Dad was a good chess player. He died three months after I was born.
Chess has improved my mind in my football with the strategies with the ball. It has improved the way I work out how to tackle, and the position of people and things. I like to set up the footy team like a chess game when I am captain.
My Dad and I play chess a lot. We play about six games a week. He beats me all the time. That is annoying. I don’t play any other games except kicking the football. Chess and football are my main interests.
I like chess better than maths but chess is pretty much maths. Chess is maths with the points and strategies. Chess has improved my thinking skills in pretty much every way. My concentration has improved. With maths chess helped me a lot. My grades were down before I started playing chess and now they are a lot higher- puzzles, numbers.When I lose I feel I need to get better. I think this person is better than me I had better train and get better. I set goals. My goal is to be one of the worlds best chess players. Chess is the best subject I do at school. Maths, science and sport are my other favourite subjects. I like chess better than computer games because computer games tell you what to do but chess doesn’t which makes it more challenging.